Context: Female sexual pain and dysfunction.
Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of a new site-specific, manual soft-tissue therapy in increasing orgasm and reducing dyspareunia (painful intercourse) in women with histories indicating abdominopelvic adhesion formation.
Design and intervention: A total of 29 new patients presenting with infertility or abdominopelvic pain-related problems, and also indicating sexual pain or dysfunction, received a series of treatments (mean, 19.5 hours) designed to address biomechanical dysfunction and restricted mobility due to adhesions affecting the reproductive organs and adjacent structures.
Outcome measures: Primary outcome measures were post-test vs pretest scores on: (1) the Female Sexual Function Index (FSFI) full scale, orgasm domain, and pain domain; and (2) 3 supplemental 10-point rating scales of sexual pain levels. Secondary outcome measures were post-test vs pretest scores in the other 4 FSFI domains (desire, arousal, lubrication, and satisfaction). The Wilcoxon signed-rank test was used for all statistical analyses.
Results: For the 23 patients available for follow-up, the paired FSFI post-test vs pretest scores were significant (P < or = .003) on all measures. Of the 17 patients who completed the 3 sexual pain scales, the paired post-test vs pretest scores were significant (P < or = .002).
Conclusions: Many cases of inhibited orgasm, dyspareunia, and other aspects of sexual dysfunction seem to be treatable by a distinctive, noninvasive manual therapy with no risks and few, if any, adverse effects. The therapy should be considered a new adjunct to existing gynecologic and medical treatments.